


Tiny Pink Small Person

by WritingInQuarantine



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: First Meetings, M/M, Parent-Child Relationship, Patrick Brewer is Gay, Rose Apothecary (Schitt's Creek)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:02:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23499466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WritingInQuarantine/pseuds/WritingInQuarantine
Summary: An alternative history for Patrick Brewer and David Rose. I don't think it's a spoiler to tell you that they're always endgame, regardless how they meet...Patrick has a child from his relationship with Rachel. A child who may view the world in a way that challenges David's carefully curated lifestyle and aesthetic.Stand alone one-shot at the moment but the world is quite keen to write itself so I'm leaving it open for further chapters.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 6
Kudos: 44





	Tiny Pink Small Person

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfic - I created the account specially to post, so please be kind! This piece sort of wrote itself for me during Corona lockdown. I've loved reading so many fanfics to keep me occupied that I thought I'd contribute something (although, it's definitely lesser quality than lots of the amazing pieces I've been hooked on.)
> 
> This is a stand alone one shot at the moment, but small bits are already trying to write themselves so I might add to this. Perhaps a full story or maybe just a series of small chapters within this Brewer history. We'll see. I'd love to try writing Alexis and Stevie at some point, not sure I'm brave enough!
> 
> I hope you enjoy. Apologies for any errors; I have no beta.

The chiming bell of the store door pulled David’s attention away from where he was leaning across multiple notepads, idly chewing the end of his pencil, brows furrowed in confusion. He glanced up, expecting, understandably, to see a customer. You know…. a person. That was, generally, what the store’s bell indicated. Instead, what he saw were some pigtails. Tied in _very_ pink scrunchies. Like, Britney-circa-2004-oops-I-did-it-again-before-she-shaved-her-head-type-pigtails.

His brows remained sufficiently furrowed as he peered over the counter to scrutinise the owner of these pigtails. Once _very_ small human. Probably female, if the pink scrunchies and long red hair indicated anything. _Eeeeew. Colour clash._ But David had made it his mission in life not to assume anything about gender. There were _plenty_ of drag queens on the New York circuit who had similar coloured aesthetics. Except, they were probably tall enough to see over his counter. Anyway, the small human of non-stereotyped-gender was also wearing dungarees, holding some kind of large, ugly leather glove on one hand which was definitely far too big for them and wearing some very muddy trainers. So, not a drag queen then. No heels. Muddy. Trainers. In. His. Store. David harrumphed before his mouth opened and closed like some kind of goldfish as he muddled for something to say.

Fortunately, the very small human broke the ice first.

“Hello!” It said chirpily.

“Hmmmm.” Came David’s brilliant and articulate reply.

“Does your shop sell ice-cream?” The giant pink and red bunches bounced in excitement at the prospect. A child then.

“Erm… no…?” David bristled and summoned up his full height, ready to lecture on how this store was a beautifully selected and curated arrangement of hand-made goods in a perfect one-stop consignment that definitely did not need to be near ice-cream. Although, he also made a mental note to ask Heather if she could make ice-cream from the goat’s milk. That was a thing, right? He was sure his caterer had created a frozen goat’s milk hors d’oeuvre for Mariana Abramovic’s gallery launch event. Maybe. Had it been goat’s-milk? It could have been from a yak. Or an elk? He blinked slowly. Still, maybe ice-cream for the Summer months wouldn’t be a bad product to look at stocking. 

The store bell chimed again and David braced himself for whatever onslaught of off-brand customer was joining this kiddie day care centre that seemed to be affronting his eyes. His eyes were drawn to a pair of mid-range denim legs with some _very_ solid thighs which he would be circling back to revisit in just a moment, thank you very much, with a tucked in standard blue shirt that some over-paid brand executive had probably pitched as something enticing like ‘Southern-France-sea-blue’ in a sales meeting even though it was _nothing_ like the sea in Poitou-Charentes where they moored their yacht. Used to moor their yacht, David mentally corrected. It was easy to forget what they’d lost sometimes.

He ignored the hideous belt.

Before he’d had the time to get lost in his pensive thoughts of a life once had, or to properly appreciate the face of Mr Mid-Range Denim, the small human in front of counter was chirping away about how fast they’d run and had he seen that and could they now please find some ice-cream?

With the kind of patient chuckle that only a father could produce, David assumed from his knowledge of noughties cliched rom-com films with your handsome, tragically widowed single-fathers, for his own father had definitely not chuckled at a small David in the same way, Mr Mid-Range Denim bent down beside the small pink humanoid and spoke quietly but firmly, “You mustn’t run ahead and go in to places, little bird. It’s ok to do running, and yes you were very fast,” he quickly interjected as the small thing opened its mouth again, “but you need to wait outside for me to catch up. If you go in to places then I can’t see you anymore and that could be dangerous. Ok?”

“Erm… hi?” David spoke, his articulation and wit shining through in buckets as he pulled Mr Mid-Range Denim’s focus away from parenting and up to him.

“Hi!” Mr Mid-Range Denim glanced up from his position on the ground and beamed a kilo-watt smile. David contemplated knocking his sunglasses down from where they were artfully perched on his head to deal with the brightness of the grin that had just flashed his way. “Hi! Sorry! Patrick Brewer.” Mr Mid-Range Denim said again, pushing himself up to full height on those _very_ beautiful and strong thighs before extending his hand out to shake with all the confidence and ease of a low-budget car salesman.

“Right. Yup. Hmmm. Ok.” David replied, showing his dazzling array of monosyllabic utterances. He glanced at the extended hand before dropping his eyes back to the small occupant which was now attached to Mr Mid-Range ‘my name’s Patrick Brewer’ Denim’s leg like a limpet. On the prospect of child germs and mud being attached to the outstretched hand, David chose to ignore it, instead, verbalising a thought that had struck him moments ago. “It’s just, you said, it could be dangerous?” This town? Really? I mean have you seen this place? The only danger around here is whether you die from the moderately-inedible food over at the Café Tropical. Or perhaps from over-exertion at the excitement of the town asbestos fair. Don’t wait too long to book your tickets ‘cause they might sell out.” David dead-panned as his hands moved at higher and higher speeds as his torrent of thoughts verbalised out. There were his words. Back again. Saying… _that_ … coulda gone for an ode to those thighs but nope. Asbestos fair. Brilliant. Just great.

A large denim grin broke out, ““Not really the parenting message that we’re going for, but thank, you, dually noted.” Warm hazel eyes lit up. 

David nodded, “Right. Ok. Well. If you want ice-cream,” the small human accompanied David’s dialogue by tugging on the sleeve of her, presumed, father and jumping in excitement, “then you probably need to risk Café Tropical.” David pointed out the window and across the street with a vague and limp wrist.

“That’s the inedible Café Tropical, right?” came the teasing reply.

“Moderately-inedible. That is correct.” David retorted primly, fighting against the corners of his lips that threatened to defy him by breaking out in a grin. Why was he grinning? His nine-step nightly facial routine worked hard to battle lines and he did not need one moderately, ok…dashingly… handsome, straight male ruining all his hard work by giving him laughter lines. 

“Really selling the place there. Do they pay you for advertising? Is it a nominal fee per customer or are you just on a monthly retainer? You should probably think about upping what you’re charging them for these sales pitches.” Came the quick-witted and gently mocking response.

Tugging gently at the sleeve of his jumper, David responded slowly, “I… I don’t know what that means.”

Mr M-RPBD (because, honestly, giving him the full “Mr Mid-Range ‘my name’s Patrick Brewer and I have beautiful thighs and a charming laugh and eyes you want to lose yourself in’ Denim” moniker was _really_ exhausting in David’s head) opened his mouth and began to respond. Presumably explaining just how ignorant David was at not understanding and joining the endless list of people who David had let down in some way by just not being enough.

David had successfully tuned him out, until he heard “… about the job?”.

“The job?” David echoed brilliantly, blinking to get himself back on track. Mr M-PPBD grinned as he pointed at the sign in the window, scripted in beautiful calligraphy that David had painstakingly written the previous week. “Right. Yup. That job. Ok. It’s just, when I was looking for an accountant and business manager, I was thinking more… tax-paying adult? Child workers are so 19th Century and the Rose Apothecary doesn’t care for the Tommy Hilfiger Chinese sweat-shop situation that happened, so, really, I’m just not really seeing this child-labour situation as a thing? And there’s not a chimney for it to go up, sooooo…?” David trailed off, eyes flashing between Denim and Pink human.

David’s face had gone for serious for a while when Patrick had explained about seeing the sign two days earlier and the store being shut when he’d tried to come in yesterday, but Patrick now found himself hypnotised by the expressive journey this theatrical face had been on. He was pleased to see that the corners of this captivating monochrome man’s eyes seemed alight with mirth as he discussed the prospect of child labour.

The delighted giggle of his daughter pulled him back from his reverie and he gave an equally lilting laugh with her. 

“It’s not ME who wants a job!” exclaimed an excitable voice, giving David PTSD flashbacks to his pageant days. “It’s my Daddy who needs a job, silly. Apparently, I have to go to school.” The harrumphing tone in the latter sentence was on a par with a six-year old Alexis and David didn’t need flashbacks to _those_ days either.

“Ah. Ok. I see. Hmmm. My misunderstanding then.” David responded, suppressing a grin that battled to break free as he caught the eye of the similarly grinning father. Turning his head slightly to direct his question at the grin, David asked, “and, you think you’re mathematically qualified to help me? To keep up with my books and purchasing and whatever the hell this programme is on my computer that it just meaningless squares and grids? I mean, are you any good at the Maths stuff?”

Before Patrick was able to explain his education, career and general aptitude for business, the small child attached to his leg bounced excitedly and proudly proclaimed that her daddy was THE BEST at Maths because he could always help her with her Maths homework and he knew all his times-tables even the twelve-times-table and everyone knows that’s the hardest times-table because that’s the most we go up to and her Daddy could even do fractions and even Katie M in Maths class couldn’t do fractions and she was the brightest kid in the class and sometimes got the answer to the division problems quicker than Miss Lacey and Miss Lacey was their Maths teacher and she was _really_ smart because she also taught them English and History and Geography too but really her favourite teacher was her PE teacher because they got to run around outside and play baseball which is just THE BEST but they weren’t allowed to play baseball, not proper baseball, in case someone got hurt so they had to use soft foam balls and it just wasn’t the same and the only time they had played with a real ball then Timmy had cried because he got hit in the face and it made his nose bleed REALLY bad, like all over his shirt, but it was his own fault for being too slow to catch the ball anyway but it was ok because her Daddy played baseball with her on the weekends, like they had this morning.

The small person had offloaded her small torrent of words before huffing with the sort of breath that reminded all listening occupants just how inconvenient needing to breathe actually was.

“Oh… My… God…” David shuddered near inaudibly to himself, before asking the important question and main takeaway from the small human’s verbal onslaught, “did Timmy need a nose job?” quietly adding, “Happens to the best of people.”

With a wry shake of his head, Patrick Brewer laid his hand gently on the dungaree clad shoulder of his offspring, the universal parental signal that meant ‘Do not respond to that. Stay quiet.’ before turning to face David with eyes that crinkled with resigned apology. “Right, I think I probably need to take this one off to get ice-cream at the Café as she can’t talk quite so much if she’s eating. I’ll drop a Resume in this week? That’ll show you that I am good at ‘the Maths stuff’ as you called it,” somehow, the mimicry was teasing and soft, not harsh and cruel like David was used to, “well, I suppose I’ll drop my Resume in if I haven’t perished from the moderately inedible food.” Patrick corrected with a wink.

“ICEEEEEEEEE-CRRRRRRRRREAAAAAAAAAM!” Came the responding battle cry as a tornado of pink and dungarees and mud hurtled towards the door. The soft cough of her father interrupted her high-speed exit and she stopped abruptly with her tiny hand reaching up to the door. With a practiced and resigned turn, she twisted to face David’s counter, “It was nice to meet you Mr…” she paused and furrowed her brow in confusion, pausing to remember if she knew the name of the strange black-and-white man behind the counter.

“Rose. David Rose.” Came his soft and almost automatic reply.

“Mr David! It was nice to meet you.” She said politely before opening the door with a rattle and hurling her small body on to the street.

Methodically, David turned his body back in the direction of his puzzling sheet of vendor orders. A normal work day he would claim later. And if anyone had asked him, he would have denied all knowledge of a pair of chocolate brown eyes haunting him all afternoon.

A pair of rich chocolate brown eyes that were still, currently stood in his shop, staring directly in to his soul. “Nice to meet you too, David Rose,” Patrick Brewer said, saying David’s name slowly; shaping the words on his lips for the first time. They felt like a prayer he’d not realised he’d known. A praise to the divine or a sonnet to a deity. Words that he could never tire of repeating. They tasted like they’d been missing for the last thirty years of his life. “I’ll see you soon, if we don’t perish at the Café… David Rose.” He winked cheekily before pulling the door shut with a careful click. The bell echoed a gentle twinkling lilt before plunging the shop into silence.

Rose Apothecary exhaled softly.


End file.
